Last-minute shopping is still men's answer to Christmas

If you haven't started your Christmas shopping and frantically end up in a supermarket on Christmas Eve, chances are you're male.

Men are three times as likely to shop on Christmas Eve and twice as likely to buy their loved ones a present from a supermarket compared with women, research from the Australian National Retailers Association shows.

As the festive season approached, 9.7 per cent of men said they expected to finish their shopping on Christmas Eve, compared with 3.6 per cent of women.

The survey, which came out on Thursday, interviewed 506 women and 497 men.

“It does confirm what we already know, that men will leave it to the last minute,” said the chief executive of the association, Margy Osmond.

“Clearly there is a different structure of organisation which reflects that mum usually runs the family."

And if you get chocolates for Christmas, it's likely this has been a last dash to the supermarket, with 4.8 per cent of men admitting that's where they will do most of their Christmas shopping, compared to 2.4 per cent of women."

The most popular shopping destinations for women were reduced department stores such as Target and Big W while men opted for the main department stores.

But most of both sexes were behind on their shopping obligations, with 27.1 per cent of women and 24.3 per cent of men expecting to finish their shopping one to two weeks before Christmas.

A smaller percentage – 14 per cent of women and 12.7 per cent of men – had finished their Christmas lists.

Mrs Osmond said she was confident shoppers would be getting the “best value” in presents because retailers had had a rough year.

Myer and David Jones have predicted a “flat” Christmas after the Bureau of Statistics showed retail spending was stagnant in October.